Show: The Vaccines
Date: September 22, 2013
Venue: The Mayan Theater
City: Los Angeles, CA
The Vaccines
Photos by Nicolas Bates
Written by Dan Sinclair
11:00 p.m. on a Sunday and the weekend’s only just begun. Fuck Monday mornings. The Vaccines are here!
Pete Robinson stands tall behind his drum set demanding crowd participation for this evening’s event via clapping hands. The loyal fans oblige as the rest of the band takes stage with the long-haired Árni Árnason on bass, Freddie Cowan donning a jean jacket and playing a guitar and frontman Justin Hayward-Young taking center stage wearing a blue New York Yankees jersey. Um, Justin, did you know where you are, dude?
But even if there are local sports fans in the crowd, they quickly forgive the singer’s faux pas once the band starts playing the first song of the night, the Wreckless Eric-esque “Blow It Up.” Everyone sings along and before you know it the fast drum intro to “Teenage Icon” comes in. The fans can no longer stand by idly and are forced to jump up and down in excitement.
The crowd recognizes the opening guitar riff to the peppy and poppy “Ghost Town,” screaming as loud as they can before Hayward-Young can even sing the first, “Oh, oh, oh!” The Vaccines seem to sincerely appreciate the crowd’s dedication judging by the smiles on their faces.
Hayward-Young finally decides it’s time to introduce the band with a “Good evening, Los Angeles! We’re the Vaccines from London, France.” I honestly didn’t know that’s where London was. I love geography! Next song is “Tiger Blood,” and Charlie Sheen would’ve been proud of the shortest little ditty of the night.
Hayward-Young is the first to put his guitar down to focus strictly on singing for “A Lack of Understanding.” Cowan follows suit to play the keyboards for an early crowd favorite in “Wetsuit.” They yell the words “Go easy on me” as hard as they can. Cowan picks his guitar back up and tosses his jean jacket offstage for “Under Your Thumb.” The writer picks up his pen but keeps his hoodie on because he’s pretty sure it will get stepped on if he tosses it on the floor.
Robinson gets a nice introduction from his lead singer and responds by banging the fuck out of his drums for a few minutes. Then “Wolf Pack” nearly brings the house down. There is a brief moment where Hayward-Young and Cowan play their guitars in each other faces, practically crotch to crotch. Now, that’s a goddamn wolf pack!
Hayward-Young tells the drunk assholes yelling out song requests that “Patience is a virtue.” Then he asks if everyone is ready to sing. Apparently they are and don’t miss a single word in “Post Breakup Sex.” During this one Cowan and Árnason jam together in front of the drums.
Árnason continues alone and the crowd claps along to the bass line for “All in White.” It’s during this one where a wasted douche bag tries to hit on a young lady whose only crime was enjoying her favorite band play live. Douche Bag’s romantic moves include yelling slurred Vaccines lyrics in the woman’s ear while smacking his own chest like a gorilla and making a face that can best be described “I have to take a major shit,” and wearing a sweater around his waist like all cool dudes do.
This continues through “Aftershave Ocean,” but eventually the girl and her friend escape, so Douche Bag puts his arm around his equally drunk and douchey friend and they head to the other side of the room in search of more women to harass.
The Vaccines are in LA to record a new EP and Hayward-Young picks up an acoustic guitar to play “Melody Calling” off of it. Next is “No Hope,” which I can only assume is dedicated to Douche Bag, who is most likely vomiting or getting thrown out. Hayward-Young puts down his guitar again and demands more clapping. He gets it and then the band plays “Wreckin’ Bar” and “If You Wanna.”
The crowd’s really into it now, as everyone leaps all over the place, enjoying every last note of “I Always Knew” and the last of the set “Family Friend.” The band then leaves the stage but the fans want more, chanting, “Encore, encore,” as if we’re in the 1930s or something.
The Vaccines close out the night with a two-song encore under a giant, shiny disco ball that comes down over the stage. The tallest member of the group, Árnason, tries to jump and touch it, but falls short. Hayward-Young tells his grateful fans “You’re very fucking lovely!” before leaving them with “Bad Mood” and “Norgaard.”
The Mayan’s packed house spends every last ounce of energy they possess screaming out the final lyrics while thrashing over one another in pure ecstasy, which I believe roughly translates to “No, The Vaccines, you are the ones who are fucking lovely. Thank you ever so kindly for rocking the shit out of my Sunday night.”